The character in armor is Sauron, the main villain in The Lord of the Rings trilogy. In the backstory, he takes control of Middle-earth by giving several Rings of Power as "gifts" to the great kings of dwarves, men, and teaches elves how to make their own. However, he also forged a master ring, the One Ring, to control the Rings of Power and ultimately rule over the kings. However, the elves were not deceived by his plan and Sauron is eventually defeated by a human who cuts off his ring finger. The books tell the story of a small group of adventurers who rediscover the lost Ring and attempt to destroy it, as Sauron's army gathers its forces to attempt to reclaim the Ring for their master.

Gil-galad is a high Elven-king, and Galadriel is an Elf of royal blood who serves as a matriarch of sorts to the remnants of the Elven race. Lindon is a location on the westernmost side of the continent, serving as the final transition point for Elves passing on to the Undying lands. Sauron refers to an actual event in the first panel, when he tried to gain control of Lindon through deceit; Galadriel and Gil-galad saw through his disguise and cast him out.

The song playing in the background is "All the Single Ladies" by Beyoncé, which includes the line "If you liked it then you should have put a ring on it," referring to wedding rings. This is shown as being what inspired Sauron to devise his plan to control others through the gift of rings.

The title text refers to an often-suggested fan theory that the One Ring is actually meant to be symbolic of marriage. The Nazgûl, also known as ringwraiths, are the former nine human kings who were bound by the rings, now a band of nine servants to Sauron who constantly seek out the Ring for him.

Randall used the wrong "û" character when editing the title text; the character he used was U+0217 LATIN SMALL LETTER U WITH INVERTED BREVE, but the correct character is U+00FB LATIN SMALL LETTER U WITH CIRCUMFLEX. They look very similar at standard font sizes, but the inverted breve is curved, while the circumflex is pointed.

Discussion

And it's the wraith-like things that quicken the heart... 108.162.230.113 10:45, 24 October 2014 (UTC)

Sauron would have known that dwarves were created by Aulë, not Eru. This was a point of contention, but resolved gently, though sternly. -Merek (no user name yet) 199.27.133.83 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

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